Contributions of Child Temperament and Parenting Stress on Sleep Behaviors During the Pandemic in Turkey

• In Event: Parenting stress and children’s socio-emotional outcomes in the context of the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Considering the importance of healthy interactions for child development, from the intra-individual level to inter-individual interactions, during the COVID-19 pandemic, these daily social interactions of children have been substantially disrupted (Bates et al., 2020). The restrictions of the pandemic circumstances caused a lack of physical activity, higher parenting stress, lack of interaction with peers, reduced outdoor time, online education, and increased screen time (Altena et al., 2020; Bates et al., 2020; Becker & Gregory, 2020; Wang et al., 2020). As interactions hold an essential role in child development, studies have been trying to understand the impact of the changes in the pandemic period on children’s sleep behaviors (Altena et al., 2020; Bates et al., 2020; Dellagiulia et al., Liu et al., 2020; Wang et al., 2020; Zreik et al., 2020). Consequently, the changes in daily routines during COVID-19 have influenced children’s sleep time, routine, and sleep quality (Bates et al., 2020; Becker & Gregory, 2020; Dellagiulia et al., 2020; Zreik et al., 2020). Living in novel and unpredictable conditions has increased both children’s and parents’ stress levels and anxiety, negatively influencing children’s sleep quality (Altena et al., 2020; Liu et al., 2020, Zreik et al., 2020). Additionally, the social restrictions and home confinement have caused to increase in blue light exposure on digital devices, decreased physical activity level, increased food consumption, and diminished exposure to daylight, all of which have significant negative influences on sleep behaviors (Altena et al., 2020; Becker & Gregory, 2020). Parents reported higher parenting stress (Brown et al., 2020) and decreased sleep duration and quality for their children during the COVID-19 pandemic (Zreik et al., 2020).
The current study examined the direct and indirect contributions of children’s temperament (reactivity, persistence, and rhythmicity), parenting stress, and bedtime routines to Turkish children’s sleep behaviors during the COVID-19 pandemic. Furthermore, this study also examined the moderating role of parenting stress between children’s temperament and bedtime routines. The sample was 313 mothers of children between 16 and 84 months (M = 52.42, SD= 12.36). Mothers reported their children’s sleep behaviors, children’s bedtime routines, parenting stress, and children’s temperament. Multivariate path analyses were run to test the direct, indirect, and moderating effects. Results indicated that parenting stress was negatively related to children’s sleep behaviors. Further, it was found that consistency of bedtime routine environments was positively associated with children’s sleep behaviors. For the indirect associations, children’s temperament (rhythmicity and reactivity) was indirectly associated with children’s sleep behaviors via the consistency of bedtime routines. For moderating effects, parenting stress moderated the association between persistence and consistency of bedtime routine behaviors. In detail, persistence served as a protective factor for the consistent bedtime routine behaviors in the existence of parenting stress. Findings underline the importance of child temperament, parenting stress, and bedtime routines for children’s sleep behaviors. The implications of the results are discussed in light of previous research and the bioecological model of human development (Bronfenberenner & Morris, 2007) in considering their functioning during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Authors

• Özge Barata, Ozyegin University
  Presenting Author

• Ibrahim Hakki Acar, Özyeğin University